Quality Assurance Systems in Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation

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ENHANCEMENT OF QUALITY ASSURANCE SYSTEMS IN HIGHER EDUCATION IN APEC MEMBER ECONOMIES developed in the national context. For example, HKCAA considers non-university level HEIs as well as operators in the private sector and training sector. Since the UGC of HK was already adequately paying attention to publicly funded universities of HK, what was needed in the national context was a mechanism to look into the areas where there were gaps and HKCAA pays attention to those areas. Thus the scope of HKCAA has been dictated by the national context and it is true for any other QA initiative. AUQA is another example where the national context influences the scope of the agency. Australia is a federation of six States and two Territories. State and Territory Governments and the Australian Government have responsibility for managing cooperatively all higher education approval processes. The State and Territory Accrediting Authorities carry out some approval processes in their respective jurisdictions and ensuring national consistency in these processes is a key issue for Australia. Consequently, as the overarching body for quality assurance in the higher education sector, in addition to auditing the Australian universities, AUQA audits the QA responsibilities of the State and Territory Accrediting Authorities. Quality assurance mechanisms of the APEC region tend to consider both private and public players, again with a few exceptions influenced by the national context. For example, there are economies where the emergence of private sector institutions resulted in the need for an explicit quality assurance mechanism. While the ministries had control (often funding-related) over the publicly funded institutions and programs, the need for a parallel mechanism to assure quality in the private sector that did not demand / have access to public funds resulted in the establishment of QA structures that paid attention only to the private sector. Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong are typical examples. In Singapore, SPRING covers the private institutions and it is only more recently that the Ministry of Education has introduced an explicit QA system for the publicly funded universities and polytechnics. It should be noted that the trend is towards a convergence. This is likely in Singapore, and Malaysia has already merged the two systems it had. The Quality Assurance Division of the ministry for publicly funded HEIs and LAN for the private institutions have been merged into the Malaysian Qualifications Authority (MQA) to cover both public and private HEIs. In general, the same standards are applied to both private and public HEIs. Some surveys mention that the standards are different. The difference may relate to the differential nature of the HEI or to the way QA developed in the economy. For example, in Singapore the publicly funded institutions are expected to describe their performance in specified academic areas, no accreditation hangs on the result, and there are some government funds to assist with quality improvement after the review. The private providers, on the other hand have a compulsory quality assurance mechanism that protects foreign students’ fees, and an optional system that is based on a business excellence model. 3.5 Aspects Considered for QA and Indicators of Quality The areas and aspects considered for the quality assurance exercises are given in Appendix 2. It should be noted that some cover QA at the institutional level and some mechanisms are at program level. Irrespective of the unit of quality assurance there are many overlapping areas. It is reasonable to assume that the difference is in the focus. When the institution is the focus of quality assurance, the standards or criteria would be about how well the institution is fulfilling its responsibility as an educational institution, with some variations depending on the quality assurance framework. If the program is the unit of quality assurance, the educational provision and quality of the particular program and its graduates become the focus. Some QA systems have considered different emphases for different cycles of QA. For example, in New Zealand, NZUAAU has done three cycles of QA. For Cycle 1 (1995–1998), it considered all institutional aspects. For Cycle 2 (2000–2001) it gave an emphasis to research related aspects (policy and management, support for postgraduate research students, the research-teaching nexus) and for Cycle 3 (2003–2006) the focus is teaching related aspects (teaching quality, programme delivery, the achievement of learning outcomes). Some more mature systems have an emphasis on quality audit and the “fitness-for-purpose” approach. They may indicate only the scope of QA in broad areas such as Organisational 12
ENHANCEMENT OF QUALITY ASSURANCE SYSTEMS IN HIGHER EDUCATION IN APEC MEMBER ECONOMIES leadership, Learning Resources, and Financial Management. But most quality assurance agencies in the initial stages of development provide detailed descriptions. Mid-way between these two approaches are the Standards of the regional accrediting agencies of the US. The Standard statements explain what is expected of an institution and what kind of evidence is needed but they do not go into micro details. With respect to the identified areas, QA systems have drawn up various guidelines to steer the QA process. Some survey respondents have indicated that they have developed a set of basic quantitative indicators which HEIs must meet. These are generally found in systems which want to ensure compliance with a basic set of requirements, in a relatively simple approach. While the use of these indicators seems to provide an objective and relatively inexpensive way to measure compliance with threshold standards, they may not address the more substantive elements involved in quality assurance. Acknowledging this, some systems have developed benchmarks and statements of standards to guide the QA process. The more common approach found in the APEC economies is a combination of standards and qualitative criteria that are developed by the QA systems but which normally involve some measure of consultation with relevant stakeholders. It is also found that QA systems that consider ‘fitness for purpose’ may not have explicit statements or indicators of quality. This approach lets HEIs develop according to their priorities and principles and it is useful where `fitness of purpose’ and `minimum threshold level of quality’ are well developed or ensured by other mechanisms that coexist in the system, thus allowing quality assurance to focus on how well the HEIs or programs achieve their stated purposes. In Singapore there are two schemes, one that is compulsory for providers that enrol foreign students, run by the Consumer Association of Singapore (CASE) and addressing the protection of student fees, and one that is optional, run by SPRING, and addressing organisational excellence. It is very difficult to identify which approach is most helpful. In more mature systems, there is emphasis on consulting the sector to identify the core areas to be covered by the QA process. In those systems the QA framework is developed as a joint effort by the QA body and the HEIs. In other cases more prescriptive indicators and requirements are imposed. 3.6 Considering Complaints Handling of HEIs Within their broad scope, QA systems in general do pay attention to the way HEIs handle complaints from various stakeholders, especially the complaints related to students and staff. NIAD-UE, ITP-Q, NZQA, and SPRING look into this issue explicitly and the scope of QA has specific standards related to this aspect. NIAD-UE has a standard which explores whether `the institution recognises the needs of students, faculty and administrative staff’. ITP-Q also has a specific standard to examine the complaint handling of HEIs. Consumers Association of Singapore (CASE) emphasises student fee protection of the private institutions and from that perspective, complaints handling is given adequate attention in the QA process. There is provision for students to lodge complaints about the SQC-PEO organisations. PAASCU looks into the minutes of meetings and probes how the HEIs have dealt with the complaints. Most QA agencies pay attention to this aspect through interaction with campus groups. For example, the audit panels of AUQA interview student associations and possibly complaints committees of the HEIs as a part of the audit program. Student surveys and how HEIs act on the survey outcomes also helps in understanding how HEIs deal with complaints. 13
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